the way I was joined irrefutably to my mother. Why had I guessed it? I didn’t look or act like him: he was large, fat, and gregarious, a walking fortress. I was small and sinewy and shy. I hadn’t earned such a grand, noble father, and he didn’t deserve such a wee, inadequate son.
“Is that why he comes to our house?” I finally asked.
“Yes, you are his child. Bob is Jonny’s father,” he continued. “That’s why Uncle Paul takes you out alone. Your mother tried to keep him out of your life. But he loved you so much he kept coming, even against her wishes.” The world was turning boundaryless. “He’s the reason you see me,” Dr. Fabian continued. “He found me and pays for me. Your mother would never permit it.”
Then he explained how, after the tests at the hospital showed that I wasn’t brain-damaged but emotionally disturbed, she decided to get Uncle Paul involved. “Before she learned you were sick she was very jealous of your father. She wanted you for herself. But once you were damaged goods she didn’t mind if he shared you. She thought it might be costly, that you might need medical care and a special school. She knew he would pay for it.”
Revelation upon revelation! But I was willingly borne along.
Dr. Fabian had unmasked my father partly because he wanted me to spend more time with him. From then on, Uncle Paul planned an evening together every month. His phone call announcing the occasion was more glorious than a birthday. “Richard,” he would say in his big voice, as if he had just discovered me, “how’d you like to get together?”
“Yay!”
My mother would put me in my best clothes and send me in a cab to the Plaza where my father stayed. With newfound confidence I marched down lobbies of chandeliers into quiet elevators that opened onto grand hallways. Uncle Paul’s room number was the key to happiness.
He met me at the door to his suite. Then we went out on the town, returning most often to the Penny Arcade where I progressed to air hockey (rotating guns blowing a ping-pong-like ball back and forth into slots for goals) and racing each other in imitation cars against landscapes that rolled by on drums.
Once, he took me to the Silver Skates at Madison Square Garden. At the start of the longest-distance race he told me to keep my eyes on a contestant he sponsored named Ray Blum. Wearing a blue and white jersey with the name “Grossinger’s” diagonally across it, his skater dropped behind and stayed in last, even as the contestants entered the final few laps. I felt sorry for him. “You watch,” Uncle Paul promised. “Ray always saves his run till it counts. He’s conserving his energy.”
I was sure he was wrong; yet, moments after he said that, Blum began to pick up speed. He caught the other skaters one by one. We cheered together as he ate up ground in great strides, streaking past the leaders as they were standing still.
Sometimes we ordered dinner by room service. I could choose anything from the menu. I usually ordered steak or liver with onion rings, pie with ice cream for dessert. “A la mode,” Uncle Paul called it.
I had a real father now, but Daddy had been my father for so long that the setup didn’t take. Daddy acted like a Daddy. He helped me with my homework and taught me to play baseball. Uncle Paul was more like a king who left his castle now and then.
The effect of Uncle Paul becoming my father was the nullification of the word itself. He didn’t seem like my father, so I could never call him Daddy. As hard as I tried, I couldn’t get the name out. I always encountered a pause mid-word, a lapse of intonation. So I didn’t call him anything.
Yet I couldn’t call Daddy Daddy anymore and I also couldn’t call him Uncle Bob—so I called him nothing too. For the remainder of my childhood I maneuvered between raindrops, timing my cadences, offsetting my phrasing in advance so as never to stumble into the word: “Daddy.”
Usually my
“Is that why he comes to our house?” I finally asked.
“Yes, you are his child. Bob is Jonny’s father,” he continued. “That’s why Uncle Paul takes you out alone. Your mother tried to keep him out of your life. But he loved you so much he kept coming, even against her wishes.” The world was turning boundaryless. “He’s the reason you see me,” Dr. Fabian continued. “He found me and pays for me. Your mother would never permit it.”
Then he explained how, after the tests at the hospital showed that I wasn’t brain-damaged but emotionally disturbed, she decided to get Uncle Paul involved. “Before she learned you were sick she was very jealous of your father. She wanted you for herself. But once you were damaged goods she didn’t mind if he shared you. She thought it might be costly, that you might need medical care and a special school. She knew he would pay for it.”
Revelation upon revelation! But I was willingly borne along.
Dr. Fabian had unmasked my father partly because he wanted me to spend more time with him. From then on, Uncle Paul planned an evening together every month. His phone call announcing the occasion was more glorious than a birthday. “Richard,” he would say in his big voice, as if he had just discovered me, “how’d you like to get together?”
“Yay!”
My mother would put me in my best clothes and send me in a cab to the Plaza where my father stayed. With newfound confidence I marched down lobbies of chandeliers into quiet elevators that opened onto grand hallways. Uncle Paul’s room number was the key to happiness.
He met me at the door to his suite. Then we went out on the town, returning most often to the Penny Arcade where I progressed to air hockey (rotating guns blowing a ping-pong-like ball back and forth into slots for goals) and racing each other in imitation cars against landscapes that rolled by on drums.
Once, he took me to the Silver Skates at Madison Square Garden. At the start of the longest-distance race he told me to keep my eyes on a contestant he sponsored named Ray Blum. Wearing a blue and white jersey with the name “Grossinger’s” diagonally across it, his skater dropped behind and stayed in last, even as the contestants entered the final few laps. I felt sorry for him. “You watch,” Uncle Paul promised. “Ray always saves his run till it counts. He’s conserving his energy.”
I was sure he was wrong; yet, moments after he said that, Blum began to pick up speed. He caught the other skaters one by one. We cheered together as he ate up ground in great strides, streaking past the leaders as they were standing still.
Sometimes we ordered dinner by room service. I could choose anything from the menu. I usually ordered steak or liver with onion rings, pie with ice cream for dessert. “A la mode,” Uncle Paul called it.
I had a real father now, but Daddy had been my father for so long that the setup didn’t take. Daddy acted like a Daddy. He helped me with my homework and taught me to play baseball. Uncle Paul was more like a king who left his castle now and then.
The effect of Uncle Paul becoming my father was the nullification of the word itself. He didn’t seem like my father, so I could never call him Daddy. As hard as I tried, I couldn’t get the name out. I always encountered a pause mid-word, a lapse of intonation. So I didn’t call him anything.
Yet I couldn’t call Daddy Daddy anymore and I also couldn’t call him Uncle Bob—so I called him nothing too. For the remainder of my childhood I maneuvered between raindrops, timing my cadences, offsetting my phrasing in advance so as never to stumble into the word: “Daddy.”
Usually my
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